DISQUS

howiekurtznot · 1 year ago

I am very pleased to see this story, which has only one notable flaw. And it is notable. You write: "...the Bush administration has, by its own admission, used 'enhanced interrogation techniques' like ... simulated drowning ..." Presumably, "simulated drowning" is meant to refer to water boarding. The problem: There is nothing "simulated" about the drowning that occurs when the torture method of water boarding is employed. The victim is in the process of drowning, with waer filling the lungs; if it continued uninterrupted, the victim would die. There is nothing "simulated" about that.

Using the false term "simulated drowning" minimizes the crime. Please call it what it is: interrupted drowning, or simply its once-common name: drowning torture.

marshalldoc · 1 year ago

I agree with Howie, above (although I think the phrase is a quote & not the author's). My response, when waterboarding is described in some squeaky-clean euphemism, is to take a lesson from right-wing 'pro-lifers' and describe it as "Partial Drowning Water Torture". Whether or not the drowning is partial or not is entirely in the hands of the torturer and depends upon their level of skill and intent since, clearly, it is entirely possible to drown a victim by waterboarding.

Regarding the article as a whole, and the discussion of Bushevik torture, if find that progressives tend to concentrate entirely upon legalisms but fail to apply some of the right wing's own yardsticks of personal integrity and disdain of moral relativism.

It's entirely clear (and made even more so by the number of hoops the Busheviks created & jumped through in order to "justify" so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques") that they knew what they were doing was utterly wrong and contrary to any accepted standard of civilized behavior and that they knew they'd crossed a fairly clear-cut line between the legal and the criminal.

What's needed here is not erudite debates of who's got the better argument for or against legal defenses of torture but someone in authority to bring charges of war crimes & crimes against humanity against the entire administration (and probably a few 'fellow-traveler' Democrats), issue warrants, and get them all in court, under oath, wearing strips. Then, let the law sort it out.

So how come, progressives are the ones who keep having to defend themselves against charges of 'moral relativism' and lack of moral imperatives?

lydiaev · 1 year ago

well written cogent article that reviews all legal aspects of the problem. Iam not so sure that genle interrogation is going to give us the answeres we're looking for but physical torture is unacceptable. Special training in interrogation techniques using a psychological approach will be more humane but will it stand up to legal scrutiny.Lydia

hach · 1 year ago

Superbly articulated position and rational, however the enemy at hand now is far worse than the Communist regime and in many aspects -worse than the Nazi war machine. The Nazis tried to respect the Red Cross and rules of law. The 'Dar al Islam' and the Al Qaeda have no consideration for life ,for women or for children (Nor to their own women and children).Actually they propagate atrocities and welcome the same...If fair treatment of your enemy is based on reciprocity-by all means keep it . If no reciprocity is expected -do all you can to ensure your survival. Hachamovitch

marj · 1 year ago

Very well written and thought provoking article. There are no easy answers here. By all rational standards, the law cannot be used to justify torture of another human being. But that is being rational and these acts that the terrorists perpertrate are irrational and it is therefore impossible to apply rational standards to them. If they are successful, they would never allow the rule of a rational law to exist anywhere they are in control. However, for our own souls there must be a better method to achieve the same ends; i.e. our safety and preservation of the democratic way of life. MARJ

stefa · 1 year ago

Very well researched opinion. Unfortunately, it ignores the reasons behind the seemingly inhumane treatment of prisoners.References to the Geneva Convention would bring a smile to Osama! To us rules of law are paramount for a civilised society. Unfortunately, we are dealing with a most cruel and unprincipled enemy. Instead of being legalistic we have to be realistic.Our democratic way of life and our existence may depend on it! Stefa

mikem · 1 year ago

We will never be able to protect our values and defend our civilization by allowing our leaders to betray our values and behave like barbarians. Many people have come to this country to escape regimes that torture and have no regard for basic human rights. Torture is not the American way.

marshalldoc · 1 year ago

Coming back to review posts since mine, I'm disappointed to find a plethora of apologists for torture.

"They're inhuman so we must be too" is what it amounts to.

Great teaching points!

While it's easy (and common) to dehumanize one's adversaries (as every culture waging war has done, including the U.S. & U.K. (demonizing the vicious & inhuman 'Huns' Nazis, 'Bosche', or 'Japs' in WWI & WWII - "Why, they kill women & children, they're inhuman so it's okay that we do whatever we feel we need to in order to protect our clearly superior society & moral values" - as the argument goes) - with each new enemy being 'different & worse than any ever before in the whole history of mankind on Earth'. Once hostilities cease however, and the previously "inhuman" enemy's inherent humanity is, again, recognized we find ourselves confronted with the failures of our own morality... Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo...

I am amazed that seemingly rational people, like those posting above, are somehow able to convince themselves that a nation can retain its moral compass by abandoning it and further, that by abandoning its moral compass it will, by some fantastic stretch of the imagination, serve as a beacon of morality to those it hopes to sway to its view.

The one issue that all the 'we must torture to survive' crowd overlooks (because it removes the only rational justification for torture) is that those professional interrogators who are intimately familiar with those who were tortured (and I'm not talking about Bushevik propaganda flaks, but the real interrogators) unanimously agree that standard interrogation methods got the best results and that tortured information was 90% lies. For the inevitable result of depending upon tortured "intelligence" (isn't that an oxymoron?) please refer to Colin Powell's speech at the U.N. justifying an attack on Iraq in which the 'proofs' were lies generated by tortured people who told their torturers whatever would make the pain stop.

Point of history Hatch... the Nazis had no respect for the ICRC. They allowed visits when it suited their propaganda purposes. They lied and denied their crimes to the Red Cross as glibly as does our own CIA. Don't you know that the ICRC wasn't allowed in Treblinka, Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen... the list goes on, an on.

sallyh · 1 year ago

Well written and timely. We need to face the contradictions between who we think we are and who we are as reflected by our actions. I doubt whether there are very many people who would stand up for the idea that infliction of pain or water boarding do not constitute torture. If the laws governing treatment of prisoners of war need to be spelled out more specifically, let's do it. But something tells me that the government officials who sanctioned the behavior of interrogators would have had the full backing of the majority of US citizens had those citizens been consulted after 9/11. So I think we should never mind spending a lot of time placing blame but learn from our mistakes and figure out how not to let this happen again. Kudos to Ms. Eviator. sallyh

micky · 1 year ago

Very good review of a difficult humanitarian and legal problem.Torture in any form should not be allowed even on people who would not hesitate to use it on us.Not only because it violates our moral standards,but also because it is usually useless in the quality of information that is obtained.Better psychological methods are available ,and those if used by experienced investegators achieve superior results.

howiekurtznot · 1 year ago

I'm with Marshalldoc. Apologists for torture are tragic.

One bizarre comment says: "If fair treatment of your enemy is based on reciprocity-by all means keep it . If no reciprocity is expected -do all you can to ensure your survival." Another says: "Instead of being legalistic we have to be realistic.Our democratic way of life and our existence may depend on it!" Hach and Stefa are claiming that to save the American democratic way of life we must give it up.

Let's see, where was it we heard about "destroying the village in order to save it"?

auslahe · 1 year ago

Forceful article

A democratic government does not brake the law!

mvguy · 1 year ago

TORTURE?? Hey we NEED all the TOOLS!! When there is a REALLY BIG CRIME to HIDE.....It is essential to have ALL THE TOOLS..Phonetaps, E-taps Propaganda & Torture are NECESSARY. First, one must investigate the CRIME........And GET THE STORY OUT of how the EVILDOERS were responsible....HEY.....They ADMIT it!!! [with TORTURE] The "witches" in Salem ADMITTED to being witches [a CRIME for which being BURNED AT THE STAKE was the penalty} to BE ALLOWED to BREATHE. Second all the EVIDENCE must be destroyed.................Interrogation tapes of "TERRORISTS" DESTROYED by CIA?? See http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1210/p03s03-usju.... THINK that the AIR TRAFFIC controllers MAY have a STORY to TELL?? 911 Air TRAFFIC CONTROLLER audio TAPES DESTROYED?? See http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=... Need More?? They dont wanna VOTE for the PATRIOT ACT?? Send them ANTHRAX!!! http://www.newsgarden.org/columns/anthrax/anthr... Why not ALLOW all CRIMINALS to use TORTURE to assist their IMAGE, SITUATION and to VANQUISH their ENEMIES...........Like legalized gambling, its legalized for YOU 2B the VICTIM not the Perpetrator.................................

twperson · 1 year ago

No bias here.....What is the "so-called" war on terror if not an "actual" war on terror? As for "stress positions and attack dogs, sexual humiliation and (my turn) "physical violence" and to the idea that the idiot Rumsfeld approved of those techniques...so what. They are not soldiers and have no right to the protections of the Geneva Conventions mandates. (a point you fail to point out)Human Rights First is a source? Please. As far as the data supplied to AP... 108 died violently in US custody, how many were severely wounded before being captured? You cherry pick your "facts" to make your case...Typical

ajamo · 1 year ago

Put in a simple wording, IT'S UN AMERICAN ACT

George Arndt · 1 year ago

Torture, contrary to the way it is often portrayed in movies and TV, torture is actually an unreliable way to obtain information from a prisoner. This is why information obtained under duress is inadmissible as evidence in most Western courtrooms. A closely related problem with torture is the phenomenon of “false positives” in which a prisoner fabricates information just to stop the torture.

anonymous · 7 months ago

I am being secretly mentally torched by the government also.The bad part about is that the citizens participate in it and they don't even know its torcher because the government blind them with money.If you being paid well to stay silent would you do anything to jepodize your steady paycheck.Especially if you have been receiving a check for over 10 years.What the government has been doing for the past 10 years is relying on the information my accussers and others have given them.From their the goverment develope and made up their own theory of what was my involvement in the illegal activities my accuser was in.Then they use deceptive tactics against me to have me talking and behaving in and out of character.In others words when my accusers could not trap me the government took over and set a trap.The government already had a plan with what they was trying to do to me since 1999.You see the government use all of my words or even if write something down on paper against me.What they do is use the government laws when its convienent for them.But go off the record when they wamt to break them.How long this is going to continue is anyone's guess.Anyway I just work up one morning and a spirit came over me and said to stop talking because it was useless.How can you keep talking trying to convince a satanic power control greedy government that your innocent.Eventually you would not have any energy anymore.Now I just keep my thoughts to myself or express them on a website.This mess been going on so long it phase out into another dimension.Just a secret government experiment if you ask me.This is a shame because I thought the black slavery days was over.This let you now that if your a person of color the government can still do what ever they want.You would expect by now someone should of stood up and put a stop to this mess especially your own race.Man what a surprise and a awakening for me.JUST PUPPETS ON A VIOLIN STRING!

johnhkennedy · 4 months ago

"The Democrats’ call for an independent investigation has received little attention – perhaps because the Justice Dept. has consistently denied that policymakers could be culpable. After all, they were acting on the advice of legal counsel."

Seems like the Justice Department is almost obstructing Justice.
Don't let Holder get away with it.

SIGN THE PETITIONS
Demanding
both a Commission of Inquiry
and a Special Prosecutor
For All Their Crimes
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